"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Newt Gingrich, plunging in the polls, dropped this bomb Wednesday: he would consider asking Sarah Palin to serve as his number two or in his Cabinet if he became president.
“She is certainly one of the people you would look at,” Gingrich said Wednesday, according to Right Wing Watch, when asked if he would consider tapping the 2008 vice presidential nominee for a second try.
“I am a great admirer of hers and she was a remarkable reform governor of Alaska, she’s somebody who I think brings a great deal to the possibility of helping in government and that would be one of the possibilities,” Gingrich said at Ralph Reed’s Faith and Freedom Coalition.

I mentioned this little blip on the radar to well known Ralph Reed aficionado Stacy McCain, and he suggested it merited a post. The conversation veered into the bizarre notions afloat these days, like the idea that Michele Bachmann was steering clear of Romney attacks in hopes of a VP slot. Stacy suggested that, given the intensity level of Presidential campaigning, the only sane reason to be in it is to win it.

We chuckled a bit at the Virginia primary fracas, clearly off topic for him while focused on Iowa. Wir mussen einen Treueeid haben* does make some sense, if you take a party-centric view of things. Sure, I’ll sign it, for the opportunity to vote against Mitt Romney, when that vote is not for keeps. Is there a reason for the increasingly Independent nature of voters, though?

One of the major American archetypes is what I call the “Tommy Boy Myth”. Stacy still hasn’t seen the flick, so I cast it in Bluto Blutarsky terms for him. Essentially, we seem to think that we can fanny about until clutch time, pull a NoDoz-driven all-nighter, and ace whatever test comes with the dawn. We love the underdog. We want to root for the Bachmann/Perry/Santorum who are fighting against “the Establishment”. Isn’t that what Sarah Palin campaigned on as Alaska Governor?

The Sarah Palin situation varies the theme considerably. How does she maximize the remaining goodwill the Tea Parties bear her, if at all? Stacy and I both are of the opinion that, given the absence of any sort of campaign staff, the calls for Iowans to caucus for Palin don’t amount to much. No amount of Tommy Boy Myth could get her on the Virginia ballot. More importantly, she the party system is set up to preclude such insurgency, not support it.

Would she be interested in playing second fiddle to a Newt? Who knows? I, for one, think she would give the GOP ticket a much needed adrenalin boost. That’s not how the party sausage is made, but there it is. Furthermore, I do hope that whoever is selected for VP is somebody young enough to run for POTUS after eight years. The situation is dire enough that, while not losing sight of the need to eject #OccupyResoluteDesk in 2012, the need for a longer-term vision to carry past 2020 is clear. Maybe that suggests Paul Ryan for VP.

But for 2012, though, the GOP head shed is hopefully considering how it will harness the Tea Party energy. Sarah would bring it by the barrel.

Theres nothing wrong with keeping one’s eye on the VP slot, after all it is one of the traditional routes to the Presidency. I couldn’t agree with you more here Smitty: “Furthermore, I do hope that whoever is selected for VP is somebody young enough to run for POTUS after eight years.” Rick Santorum will be 61 in 2020. Food for thought.

Considering that running for VP in ’08 pretty much destroyed her political career, she’d be really, really dumb if she did it again.

As for Energy Secretary, what a dumb idea. She isn’t qualified for it (it’s a job for somebody with a nuclear physics background) and it has nothing to do with her areas of expertise (oil, gas, forestry, national parks, fish and game management, etc). Interior Secretary would be a far better fit for her.

Dcmick December 30th, 2011 @ 9:53 pm

First off, Ed Rollins comprehensively confirmed longstanding suspicions that Bachmann had been doing yeoman work for Romney.

She attacked Gingrich while giving a pass to Santorum?

Why did she do that? Logic would have dictated that she simultaneously take a swipe at the guy who was competing for the same sliver of the base, which was then Santorum.

But in as much as she had ample opportunity to tee off on Romney, and each and every time steered clear of doing so, while not passing on a single occasion to go off after every threat to Romney, only a political simpleton would conclude that she was “in it to win it.”

Dcmick December 30th, 2011 @ 9:55 pm

Perry blunders during debates.

Perry blunders while speaking away from debates.

Perry consistently betrays his invincible ignorance……..

Why burden Santorum with Perry, he’s going to have enough problems with some of things he’s done.

If a Republican is elected to the White House next November (something I still consider highly unlikely), I’d expect to see Palin approached for, accept, and be confirmed to (assuming the GOP doesn’t take big losses in the Senate as well), a cabinet spot.

Given her experience governing the largest state in the union, of which 65% is owned/administered by the federal government and which also has a large state land ownership/administration footprint, Interior seems like a very good fit. She already has experience dealing with the Bureau of Land Management, the US Forest Service, et. al.

What I can’t see is her being willing to play second fiddle in a presidential campaign for the second time in a row.

It wouldn’t be good for her — the closest approximation that comes to mind is “typecast.” To the extent that she may have presidential ambitions for 2016 or 2020, being a two-time loser at that level would damage them.

It also wouldn’t be good for the ticket for various reasons, ranging from her arguably being an overshadowing figure versus any of the likely nominees, to it raising the question of how thin the GOP bench is that they have to recycle veep candidates.

SDN December 30th, 2011 @ 10:14 pm

On the other hand, there’d actually be a Rick on the ticket that’s had executive experience….

How desperate is Newt to float the idea of Palin on his ticket? She clearly wouldn’t accept, for him or anyone else.

But we needn’t worry about who’ll be ready in eight years. The next President, assuming the GOP wins, is almost guaranteed to be a one-termer. Straightening out the fiscal mess Obama has complicated into a crisis will require a lot of cut spending, and that means widespread layoffs of federal employees and those we subsidize. Even if economic growth restarts with the sane fiscal policy, unemployment will remain in the same range it is now for years, only it will be former federal employees out of work, and who’s ever going to hire them?

And if, as some fear, the cuts aren’t made by a Republican President and Congress, then the economy will only deteriorate and our credit rating will decline, interest payments will skyrocket, and the whole thing is almost as bad as keeping Obama and Reid (except for judges and regulations). So once again, we’re looking at a one-termer.

Besides, we have a bench which will be ready by 2020 anyway: Jindal, Christie, perhaps even Ryan or Rubio will have served as Governor by then, and don’t underestimate Bob McDonnell or Scott Walker, either. If Gingrich’s marital past isn’t a disqualifier, by then Mark Sanford may be rehabilitated sufficiently. If that guy met a legislature willing to reform the government, we could clean up the government in four years.

Oh BULL FUCKING SHIT!! It was Ed Rollin’s god damn strategy to begin with, why else would he even know about it, and that’s even assuming that weasel-faced fuckass is even telling the truth. HE’S the goddamn “stalking horse” for Romney, and was the entire time he was with her campaign. She should sue the bastard. The minute he joined her campaign he tried to sabotage her standing with the base and with the Tea Party by attacking Sarah Palin, something I objected to strenuously. Ed Rollins is a piece of fucking shit. Nothing would make my New Years get off to a rollicking good start more than hearing somebody just beat the living crap out of that old cocksucker.

Who in the hell do you know of that is going to put themselves in debt, run a traditional Iowa campaign crisscrossing the state for weeks, for months, hire the most paid staffers for the longest period of time, all on the off chance somebody might consider them, just think about them, as a potential VP.

I don’t doubt that was a consideration, but one, it was never her major goal. Her number one goal was to win the nomination. And number two, if it was a secondary strategy, yes it was a bad idea, but it originated from that piece of shit Rollins. And again, HE’S the goddamn stalking horse for Romney.

Half of these goddamn so-called Republican political operatives need to move over to the fucking Democrat Party where they god damn belong.

There you go again. Why do you assume these cuts have to come automatically, all at once? You lay off some, you phase some departments out, you buy out some employees through early retirement packages, and since you’re always going to need new blood (especially in places like the FBI, ICE, etc) you reduce hiring on average to one for every two let go, or something like that. And you phase this in over a period of years precisely to prevent the kind of economic disruption you are talking about. As you grow the economy some of these government employees can find new work in the private sector, what ones don’t probably aren’t capable, and most of them should probably be let go anyway. The growing economy would more than balance out what they would add to unemployment.

You’re so goddamn negative, its no wonder you think Romney is as good as we can hope for.

A conservative-running Newt with tea-party backing should NOT pick a conservative Sarah with tea-party backing.

The fact that he suggests this shows he is either lying to us all to drum up support (he gets everyone to vote for him because they think he’ll put Sarah in as VP and then he doesn’t), or that he is honestly going to do this and lose the election to Obama (Palin is not popular with independents and moderates and the point of a VP is to broaden the ticket and get new people to vote for you without adding any negatives).

Bad move, Newt.

Dcmick December 31st, 2011 @ 9:24 am

Sarah Palin would jump at the slightest chance to be part of a genuine reform administration.

And she would jump at the chance to run with Gingrich, for she would know that Gingrich would set her loose, whereas McCain strangled her by surrounding her with Bush’s communication team.

If Gingrich is the insider you and others suggest, then why the panic from those everyone concedes is on the inside?

Or in another way, how can Satan cast out Satan?

The establishment long ago marked out Gingrich, and they marked him out as their mortal foe. Does that mean he can’t make money from how the existing system operates? No, not at all.

Hilarious.
I thought TPTB tried to say Sarah brought McCain down (in spite of all evidence to the contrary) and now they come begging for her to help them out after how they treated her.

I’m going to have to go get a Sam’s sized box of popcorn for this election year.

Dcmick December 31st, 2011 @ 9:35 am

“[D]ebt?”

Cut me a fricken’ break!

When was the last time you heard of a politician being crushed by debt? They hardly even take the thought seriously……. That just told me how little you know of the thought processes of politicians.

Think of the cost benefit analysis here.

She was a bomb throwing back bencher who had already been locked out of any worthwhile chairmanships. She made it quite clear that she thought she was damn well entitled, yes ENTITLED to a serious chairmanships of a plum committee. Her House leadership steered as clear from her as they possibly could.

She’s going nowhere fast in the House, and in Minnesota, she’s not a prayer of winning state wide election, which means the Senate and the Governor’s mansion are out of reach.

So what is an overly ambitious chick to do? Decisions, decisions…….

What she did was use her bomb throwing and her grandstanding to make a play for a VP slot?

She NEVER had the resume for any serious run at the nomination, ESPECIALLY in a party that doesn’t go for members of the House.

HEY rocket scientist, when was the last time a party nominated a member of the House?

DUH!

She was angling all along, which meant she hoped to ingratiate herself with that guy who was likely to be the nominee. Which meant she had to ingratiate herself with that guy who had the financial sourcing already backed up.

If you had been paying attention over a year ago, you would already have noticed that the GOP establishment was already telling Governors who were considering jumping into the race not to bother, for Romney had already sewn the money up. Romney feared Perry uniquely because Perry had Texan money behind him, thus INDEPENDENT sources of financing.

Stop pretending to yourself that the lady in white was all that.

She’s a bomb throwing, falsehood churning jerk who just did tremendous damage to the country and the party, because she left the party more vulnerable than before to the predations of a Romney.

What’s the use, I might as well be tossing darts against plexiglass……

Dcmick December 31st, 2011 @ 9:40 am

Hey pagan, here’s a newsflash, politicians don’t see furthering their ambition as acting like a snake.

They delude themselves that it’s all done for some altruistic purpose. You clearly don’t understand the level of ego present. Just walk the corridors of the Rayburn building, or the Cannon office building, ego and pride waft out of every door you walk past, ooze from the flooring, descend from the ceilings. EVEN THE DAMN STAFFERS are egomaniacs. Sometimes teh damn staffers are worse than their principals!

That’s the kind of insanity we’re dealing with here.

That’s why we need a guy like Gingrich to scorch the earth inside the Beltway!

Right, we don’t need a good woman who some snake in the grass son-of-a-bitch says is just trying to run for VP, but in the meantime has spent months running a traditional campaign, crisscrossing Iowa meeting people from all walks of life, has hired the most campaign staff of any candidate and worked her fucking ass off because she cares about this country and the constitution.

We’d be much better off electing somebody that was so obviously running for President out of a plan to sell books or increase his speakers fees, that he never even bothered to put together an Iowa staff, paid or volunteer either one and never spent any real time in the state or put any other kind of effort into it.

Have you got a link to any of that rant or did you just regurgitate it from the pages of KOS and are ashamed to admit it? Bomb thrower? Wow, so that’s what the current meme is about Tea Party politicians huh? Did that come from the Democrats or from some establishment RINOs? Then again it doesn’t really make any difference does it?

Bachmann is an asset precisely because she doesn’t pander in the hopes of winning statewide election. She could do so easily enough, but who the hell wants a female Pawlenty? Do you? I have no doubts if she was the nominee, or VP either one, she would not help win Minnesota. I don’t care because we’re not going to win that idiot state anyway.

Hey, I know, what we need is “Mr. I’m Going To Run A Positive Campaign Because I’m Too Big A Pussy To Take Any Real Heat”.

I understand your worries though. Bachmann might be the kind of politician who might take money from Freddie Mac. Shit, she might even sit on a loveseat beside Steny Hoyer and promote AGCC. She might even refer to Paul Ryan’s budget plan as “right-wing social engineering”?

Not really, I said that because he is always saying that, and I always feel compelled to respond, but he never seems to hear me. That’s probably because he’s a Romney supporter, judging by the times I’ve seen him get so bent out of shape anytime somebody says something bad about Romney.

And frankly, its probably an accurate reflection of Romney’s attitude about cutting government. It will be one of these cases where it turns into cutting the rate of growth and that will end up being by two or three percent, at most, and that will be swallowed up by the next “emergency”. They know they can find something to qualify as such. The sad truth is, establishment Republicans only give lip service to cutting government for the simple fact, government is power, and the more the better.

Hell, even Crazy Ron Paul knows you would have to phase in any amount of significant cuts in government and government spending. If he knows it, Adjoran knows it.

This seems to be a way to phase us in to accepting that there is never going to be any significant cuts in a way that will be more palatable to accept. But some of us know better and will never accept it.

That’s a pretty good description of Newt’s campaign right now. He’s a “floater”, waiting for somebody to come along and flush him on down, and out.

Pathfinder's wife December 31st, 2011 @ 11:24 am

Heh, the irony of it is schadenfruedenlicious.

Pathfinder's wife December 31st, 2011 @ 11:32 am

That’s where I see her at: Dept. of Interior. She’d do quite well there I think and be a benefit to the country.
As VP pick, probably not so much — the Sarah hate is still strong thanks to the smearing she got from both sides. This gesture from Newt smacks of an optics campaign only. Why should she say yes to that?

Bwha. If our ticket was going to be Gingrich/Palin I would invest money in pants-making companies because our counterparts on the left/right divide would be soiling theirs constantly. It could prove to be the most fun campaign to watch since Reagan’s re-election in 1984.

Tennwriter December 31st, 2011 @ 3:13 pm

Indeed, a Gingrich/Palin campaign would be wildly fun.

Part of that is that both would be ‘bomb-throwing’ like Dcmermick says about Bachmann which is what we need. We need more bombs, and then tough, disciplined soldiers advancing behind the cover of the bombs.

Keep up the skeer. And right right through them.

———-

That said, its still Santorum, Bachmann…but twould be fun. Not that its going to happen.

Tennwriter December 31st, 2011 @ 3:21 pm

Or like with John McCain, to try to assure the Base that you’re not severely damaged goods. It worked for McCain in that he did not make as big a crater as he would have without Palin.

He was heading for a world historic shellacking instead of just a massive defeat, and it could have been better if Palin had not been managed and backstabbed and RINOed.

You assert she’s not popular with independents. I have a friend who says he’s the son of independents and an independent himself. He has, IMO, if not in his, centrist democrat views. But he refuses, along with many others, to vote for the party that supports abortion.

Palin is too smart, as I see it, to accept another VP spot. In the first place it would make the Repubs look foolish to go with a retread of the previous ticket, regardless of whom the Pres candidate would be. In the second place, Sarah knows she’s capable of handling the top spot were it feasible under present political conditions.

Interior Sec would be perfect for her, with Energy folded into Interior. We don’t need a technocrat to run Energy, as the present
idiot occupant clearly proves. What we need is a spike-heeled dominatrix to straighten out the wusses who are restraining the American drive for energy independence.

Palin must be enjoying a tremendous feeling of scandenfreude right now, as she has become, after Reagan, the favorite old-time conservative of most candidates.

[Scandenfreude, for those unfamiliar with the term, is the dark joy Norwegians feel in the failure of others. And Palin is, of course, a Norse name.]

If Newt wins, he is going to win by going after the same crowd Palin would win, so she wouldn’t add a lot to the ticket if she was the VP nominee. He would be better grabbing some sort of moderate policy-wonk, probably young and from the midwest, who is pro-life- maybe Paul Ryan or something?

Sarah Palin would be a perfect fit for Romney- he’s more of the moderate and she would add a lot to his ticket.